Lublin claims the title of the most driver-friendly city in Poland

Importantly, the study was not compiled based on potentially biased opinions of citizens of respective cities, but it relied on data from Poland’s largest cities across a range of categories:

– parking,

– number of road accidents,

– fuel prices,

– average driving speed,

– cost of tyre fitting,

– cost of motor third-party liability premium,

– ecodriving,

– carsharing.

To come up with the ranking, researchers gave each city a score for each category awarding between 9 points for the best city and 1 point for the worst performer. The study covered two groups of Polish cities: those populated by up to 300k citizens (scores between 10 and 1) and those with the population exceeding 300k. In the latter group, behind Lublin, which scored 46 out of potential 61, Szczecin and Gdańsk were both ranked 2nd most driver-friendly cities with a score of 40.

To start with, the data collected from municipalities, city road authorities and the mobile navigation application Yanosik showed that Lublin ranked best in the country for average speed, calculated as the speed both in the city centre and within the city’s borders, which proves that congestion and traffic burden in Lublin are among the lowest in Poland, especially when compared to the likes of Kraków and Wrocław which for many years have been suffering from heavy congestion.

What is more, Lublin offers the cheapest annual cost of car insurance which stood at PLN 536, followed by Kraków (PLN 599) and Bydgoszcz (PLN 611). To calculate a premium authors of the study created a 35-old married male character with two children who drives three most popular cars. Not surprisingly, Wrocław, Gdańsk and Warsaw took the bottom spots in this ranking category.

When looking at the average cost of tyre fitting, again, Lublin takes the top spot in the ranking (PLN 20.14).

The data also reveals that drivers in Lublin should be satisfied with the level of parking fees, which are third-lowest among all cities analyzed in the study (PLN 2.89 an hour, ex-aequo with Wrocław). What is more, Lublin ranks second in the category of fuel prices, and only Łódź can boast cheaper fuel.

To be fair, there are also criteria in which Lublin lags behind its competition, like road safety, ecodriving and Park & Ride infrastructure. However, with the recently completed P&R investments in the suburbs (Choiny St, Abramowicka St), planned P&R and K&R infrastructure at other major entry/exit points across the city, as well as with the growing number of electric car charging stations, Lublin is on the right track to improve its position in these categories next year.

Finally, it should be noted that as the 10th biggest city in Poland Lublin offers the 6th largest carsharing fleet (149 cars). Only Warsaw, Tricity, Kraków, Wrocław and Poznań as much bigger locations have more cars in the system.

In the group of cities populated by up to 300k people, Gliwice left all other cities behind with an excellent score of 51 points out of possible 68, followed by Kielce (50) and Sosnowiec (48).

Interestingly, Lublin proved to be the best city for motorists for the second time in a row. In 2018 the winners’ line-up was almost the same, as Szczecin and Gdańsk were ranked second and third respectively. This proves that the road infrastructure investments carried out in recent years in Lublin and the city authorities’ smart transport and communication policies are really working.

Find out more about the study here (in Polish): https://www.oponeo.pl/artykul/ranking-miast-przyjaznych-kierowcom